


Of Anything Bare (That's Made of Gold)

by imprintofadream (imprint_of_a_doe)



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Banshee Lydia Martin, Beta Derek Hale, Bisexual Derek Hale, Bisexual Stiles Stilinski, Canon-Typical Violence, Cunnilingus, Enthusiastic Consent, Explicit Sexual Content, F/F, Female Derek Hale, Female Stiles Stilinski, Future Fic, Getting Together, Monster of the Week, Pack Dynamics
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-19
Updated: 2017-10-19
Packaged: 2019-01-19 12:37:25
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,366
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12410451
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/imprint_of_a_doe/pseuds/imprintofadream
Summary: The conversation after the fight basically factors out to “I found Peter and sacrificed him to bring Allison back and I’m not sorry about it,” from Lydia and “Don’t look at me, I just did what she told me to,” from Stiles, which, while all true, leaves a lot out. Derek should probably be more worried about that than what Stiles means to her right now.





	Of Anything Bare (That's Made of Gold)

**Author's Note:**

> Give me all the femslash!Derek/Stiles please. Ladies loving ladies is my only joy in this terrible year. (And because the archive doesn't have an appropriate tag that I could find, both Derek and Stiles are cisgender women in this fic.)

—

Stiles pushes her aside to get into the loft, already spouting off some bullshit theory a mile a minute as she swings her backpack down into her usual spot on the couch, because even though she’s in her third year at Berkeley, she’s still here often enough to have one. Derek clenches her teeth and pulls the sliding door shut with a heavy thump, turning to see Stiles bent over her fridge, one hand gesturing through the air above the door where her head’s disappeared.

“Do you mind?” Derek interrupts. Honestly, she knows better than to expect a proper reaction, she really does. From the moment Stiles’ too-quick heart thumped its hummingbird beat in the Sheriff's cruiser so long ago, Derek has known. 

Stiles lifts her head just enough to peer over the door of the fridge, eyebrows hiking up in the most blatant ‘no?’ Derek’s seen in a while. Sometimes she looks at herself in the mirror and studies her own face, tries to see how her eyebrows are any more intense than Stiles’. She still hasn’t figured it out, but then Stiles has one of the most mobile faces — _bodies_ — ever. Where Derek’s eyebrows move, Stiles’ entire _being_ jumps into action.

Sometimes, when she’s alone, Derek likes to imagine just how her expression might slacken when she’s shaking apart on Derek’s fingers, her own clenched into her palms, back arched and wide mouth open around a gasp, a moan, Derek’s name. Derek pretends she never thinks about it.

“Anyway, so Scott says Deaton says ifrit, which, I mean, it’s totally possible. I’m not sold on the idea, though. I love Scott, but sometimes he doesn’t catch everything I’m saying so he might have left some of the pertinent info out and Doctor Less Than Forthcoming might be working on less than the full picture. _I_ do have the full picture, no matter what Lydia says.” Stiles straightens up again to look at Derek emphatically, the door of the fridge just cutting off the lower half of her face. 

“Right,” Derek mutters. “Of course you do.” Derek runs the heel of a hand over one eyebrow, up through her hair; it needs a wash, probably. Still smells like smoke and dirt. She should cut it, but sometimes she thinks she looks more like her mom, like Laura, with it getting longer, so she doesn’t do anything about it.

Stiles sets about making a sandwich, pressing leftover chow mein onto a piece of bread opposite the peppers and salmon Derek bought last week. The pack always eats the weirdest shit left in the fridge. Derek doesn’t know if she’s ever cleaned it out herself between Stiles, Scott, and Malia. Derek literally banned the high school betas from hanging out here to preserve her grocery budget as it is.

“I’m going to shower,” she says uselessly, awkward on her own two feet in her own damn apartment. Stiles makes her hot under the collar, makes her hair stick to the back of her neck and between her shoulder blades. 

The water pressure never reverted to its initial strength after the time Isaac broke one of the pipes downstairs, despite whatever Cora tried fixing it with. It sputters when Derek turns the water on and Derek eyes it warningly as she strips out of her soiled clothes, throwing them into the corner. She steps on a loose bit of gravel that fell out of her jeans and swears, climbing into the stall. At least the water, weak as it is, still runs hot.

She tilts her head back under the stream and closes her eyes, breathes out deep and even. 

Laura used to hate living with her in Brooklyn. Claimed there was never any hot water left when Derek was done, claimed Derek used her shampoo all the time, claimed lots of things, really. Laura liked to blame the most inane things on her, but she never blamed her for anything important, even when she should have, even when Derek blamed herself.

Derek washes her hair out, scrubs at the soot and blood and sweat ground into her, and then she sits at the bottom of the shower under the spray, lets it trickle down her arms, over her shoulders, through her hair and across her face. She watches the water flow down the drain, eyes half-lidded, and remembers digging her claws into Cora’s side to jump-start her healing, remembers her bright eyes fixing on Derek’s with a plea caught in her throat this morning.

She forcefully pushes the image away. Cora is fine — will be fine. Malia and Deaton have it under control in a way Derek never could.

Her arms shake when she wraps them around her knees; she presses claws into her palms to stop herself, to ground herself, and by the time she dries off in front of the clouded mirror, her skin bears no sign of it, the new blood washed down the drain with the old.

—

“Yes, Lydia, I’m aware.” Stiles’ irritation grows louder without the sound of the running water to cover it and Derek shakes her head, still toweling at the damp tangles of her hair where it wets her new shirt. “It’s not that I don’t trust Allison’s ghost or whatever, really, but I maybe _don’t_? What have we learned from spirits?”

The floor feels cool against her bare feet, the concrete making it easy to sneak up behind the couch without Stiles realizing. She’s barely able to catch the title of each page of the PDF on the screen as Stiles scrolls through, phone on speaker mode beside her; her elbow hangs over the arm of the couch, one foot sweeping the floor and the other tucked up under her. Derek helplessly watches her toes curl with each aggravated punch of a key.

“Remind me which of us is the banshee seeing her dead best friend in her dreams?” Lydia asks, sweet like poison. Derek steps back and circles the couch to take the armchair, Stiles barely acknowledging her presence. Lydia’s voice sharpens the way it usually does when Stiles pisses her off. Honestly, Derek relates to Lydia on a very base level when it comes to Stiles.

“Look, okay, I totally get it — you and Allison are bros for life and, uh, past life, obviously. If it were Scott, I’d be the same way! Except Scott never tried to kill anyone — fuck, okay, that’s a lie — uh…”

“Does Derek trust Allison?” Lydia interrupts, and Stiles whips her head up to meet Derek’s eyes expectantly. She feels her eyebrows jump, her fingers curling into her palms. It says a lot that Lydia _expects_ Stiles to be here, unless Stiles just told her earlier in the conversation. Maybe Derek is just jumpy because the not-quite-jailbait sprawled on her couch cushions would look even better spread out across her rumpled sheets —

“Do you?” Stiles asks shrewdly. “Like, if, say, Lydia were seeing Allison in her dreams and Allison was supposedly sharing major hints in said dreams, would you be down to follow that advice or would you start droppin’ fang?”

Sometimes Derek regrets her attraction to Stiles more than she regrets fucking anyone else, ever. She hopes her expression accurately communicates that in this moment. “Shut the fuck up and listen to Lydia.”

“Thank you, Derek,” Lydia sighs from the phone. “Now, check page 237 of the bestiary like I _told_ you to twenty minutes ago.” 

“I hate that you can see what page I’m on,” Stiles grumbles at her laptop, flinging a leg over the back of the sofa and scooting down to lean her head on the armrest. Derek thinks about shoving her off the couch. She only refrains because Stiles will tell Scott and Scott may or may not scold Derek about being gentle with the humans, depending on how busy he is at that point. Scott’s lectures are the worst — Derek always feels like shit about herself during them, like Scott’s some kind of parental figure despite his youth and despite the fact that he usually takes _her_ advice. 

Sometimes growing up as the middle child conditions a girl to be both follower and teacher at any given moment. 

She hopes her mother would be proud of how far Derek’s come since the fire.

—

Stiles texts the pack while Derek and Kira are tracking the lady Cora swears attacked her; her phone goes off silently and Derek glances from the road for just a second. “Is that them?” she asks Kira, fingers flexing on the steering wheel as she refocuses.

“Yeah.” Kira’s silent for a second before she offers, “Stiles says they’re pretty sure it’s a lamia and that it definitely killed that barista and the city gardener. The college student was something else, but it also got Cora.” 

“Okay, so what do we do now?”

“Hang on, Scott just texted. . . . I’m sharing our location and they’re going to meet us so we can corner her and end this. Stiles and Lydia say they’ll be late, Jordan is on duty so he’s going to try to keep the police away from here, and Malia is staying with Cora unless we really need them.”

“We won’t,” Derek promises, turning right in the wake of the blue Honda the lamia apparently drives. She’s glad, honestly, that so much of the pack will be out of danger; she’s glad that Stiles especially might miss it entirely. Of every one of the too-heroic kids who grew up into this pack, Stiles exudes bravery to the point of stupidity despite her intelligence, weight balanced evenly between fragile and indestructible, and for once Derek won’t be distracted trying to keep her from doing something rash.

Fifteen minutes later, Scott’s motorcycle pulls off of a side street ahead of them; Hayden’s car edges out when Derek passes the street and Derek shakes out her shoulders. “Now?” she asks Kira, glancing sideways. She nods, serious, and unbuckles her seatbelt to reach into the back and pull her katana into her lap.

Scott speeds up on his bike and flicks his claws out to slice the lamia’s tires, giving her no choice but to pull over behind the ironworks, and Derek swings the car in behind her, blocking the way out even as Kira jumps out before she fully stops, unsheathing her sword. The lamia takes off on foot, as they expected, and Derek, Scott, and Kira follow her carefully until she runs into Hayden, Mason, Corey, and Liam on the other side. 

“I wondered whether the so-called pack in this town would even bother with me,” the lamia says, focus shifting from the betas to eye the rest of them. Her gaze is heavy and hooded, bright and dangerous, and Derek thinks involuntarily of the rattlesnake in the preserve that bit Laura when she was 12. “I’m just passing through.”

Scott takes a deep breath and steps forward as the Alpha, eyes flashing red at her. Derek stands a little straighter, feels her claws slide out but keeps the rest of the shift at bay in case — for once — this goes their way. “You’re trespassing in our territory without permission, you’ve attacked our pack member, and you’ve been attached to at least two murders while you’ve been here. We can’t turn the other cheek when you’re killing the citizens of this city, so we have to ask you to surrender.”

The lamia looks at Scott with a lowered brow, motionless and quiet but for the way she shuffles her feet together and toes off her shoes. Derek sighs and lets the rest of the shift fold over her, cracks her neck into it and lets her arms drop to her sides.

Still, it’s a surprise when the lamia’s first move is to spit at them, more surprising when it’s a spray of venom that has them scrambling back as it burns through the asphalt at their feet. When Derek peeks over the edge of the dumpster she dove behind, she blinks, glances sideways at Kira to see the same expression of resigned disbelief on her face. Scott growls and shakes his shoulders out, clearly pissed that nothing ever goes according to plan, and the lamia — now standing an extra four feet tall on a thick, scaled tail with another eight feet of it coiled around her in place of her legs — flicks her hands out to reveal her own talons, hisses back.

Someone’s phone goes off as the pack starts to move in, tentatively testing her range, and Mason groans, yells something about Stiles and venom, which Derek very much does _not_ need right now as she gets in close to the lamia, finally, and tears across her tail with her claws — tries to, at least. The muscles under the scales flex and her claws scratch across the surface without breaking it. Derek hurriedly ducks the lamia’s backhand and surveys her again for weaknesses, watches Scott dive out of the way of another spray of venom. She’s just decided to aim higher, for skin this time, when Liam yelps behind her.

Derek spares a peek over her shoulder to make sure nothing else has joined in and pays for it when the lamia’s claws tear through her upper arm. She snarls, turning back, and sees Kira’s sword blurring through the air, stumbles out of range and trips over the lamia’s tail like a fucking _dumbass_. Derek goes down hard on her back, wheezing for air when the heavy tail slams down on her ribs, breaking at least a few, and then the lamia’s claws are around her neck, hauling her up to use as a bodily shield against the pack. 

Eyes watering, Derek finally sees what made Liam react, and her hands go limp where they’re scrabbling at the lamia’s. She wonders if it’s oxygen deprivation as her head spins.

Allison Argent stands tall and willowy at the edge of battle, arrow notched in her bow and poised picture-perfect from memory, and Derek gasps for air as the demon releases her throat and throws her forward. The ground knocks what little breath she has from her abused lungs when she hits it, hard and unforgiving, and Allison is still _there_. Behind her, Stiles and Lydia both grin from her shadow. 

The lamia sighs, lifts her hands lazily. “Please, spare me.”

Derek snarls at her even as she shakily pushes herself to her hands and knees, blood snaking down the gash in her arm to pool under her fingers. 

Scott darts forward to wrap an arm around her waist, pulling her the rest of the way back, and she fights the snarl in her throat at the pressure against her busted ribs. “C’mon, Derek, help me out here,” he pleads, adjusting his grip. She manages to get to her feet, swaying as they back away from the creature and toward Kira, and Derek presses her hand over her bicep where it’s flayed open for all the world to see. Scott glances at the wound and grimaces. “Shit, I think her claws are coated in venom too, dude. That’s what she got Cora with last week.”

“Great,” she growls. “I didn’t need to know that just yet.”

“Yeah, well…” Scott trails off, looking over at Allison again. “I… Derek, you see her too, don’t you?”

The edge of hope in his voice is tainted by remembered pain, heavy with guilt, and Derek stares at her, the straight line of her back, the ease with which she holds her stance. The bow in her hand seems to be the one Lydia’s kept in her trunk for the last three years. “Yeah, Scott, I see her.”

“Fuck.” His voice catches. He visibly shakes himself and tries to refocus on the lamia, and Derek follows his example with difficulty even though her right hand won’t curl into a proper fist anymore. If nothing else, she understands she must protect her Alpha, and that’s what Scott is to her now. He’ll always be that floppy-haired kid who couldn’t let infatuation fall to responsibility, somewhere in her memory, but he’s grown now, long before his time. Derek sees a bit of her mother in him, sometimes. 

“We’ve got this under control, guys,” Lydia calls from behind them. Derek can _hear_ the vicious smugness of her smile.

“Lamias supposedly shrink from silver,” Stiles adds. “And who do we know who fights _death_ with silver? Yeah, bitch, we brought Allison back just to slay your ass.”

“Not _just_ , Stiles, don’t be a dumbass,” Lydia snipes. 

Derek’s about to yell at them, but Allison’s voice cuts across all sound in the parking lot, weary and fond. “Guys, argue later, save the town now?”

“Sounds good, Ally A. I’ll just let you get down with your bad self from over — _ow_ , Lydia, what the _hell_?”

“Shut up, Stiles!” Derek yells over her shoulder, trying to focus on the lamia, who’s fucking _rolling her eyes_. The poison in her arm burns like acid, slow and effective. Derek really hates this town sometimes. 

“You all seem like psychotic kids and whatnot, but you really don’t want to press a girl like this,” the lamia drawls, accent twanging. She’s from the fucking South of all places, Derek thinks wildly. “Gets a little dangerous at times.”

“ _You_ don’t want to press a girl like me, either,” Allison snaps, and the first arrow flies past Derek’s shoulder, past Scott’s, to embed itself in the lamia’s upper arm. She screams, loud and long, rage building, and Derek covers her ears helplessly, stumbling back. Scott’s roaring in response, Stiles cussing, and then everything is lost in a haze of sound, like her mother’s voice, soft and soothing, and Derek falls to her knees, blind with loss and hope, blind with memory. 

She knows, somewhere in her memory, that lamias use their voices as weapons, knows her mother from this facsimile, but tearing herself away from it proves more than difficult to manage. Talia kneels in front of her, her hands gentle on Derek’s wrists where she still covers her ears, and Derek’s eyes fill with tears. She squeezes them shut, shakes her head. If she focuses, she feels the blood still thick on her skin, tickling her as it drips down her elbow. 

It’s hard to focus.

And then Derek’s screaming too, kneeling on the gravel of the parking lot with her arms and forehead against the ground, Lydia’s wail ringing loud and clear. The enchantment fades, shatters under the shrillness of a banshee call. In the hollow ringing that follows, Derek loses every sense but that of pain. 

Hands grip her firmly by her shoulders then, pulling her backward, upright on her knees, and Derek opens her eyes to stinging sunlight, the smell of her own blood hot in her nose. Someone is talking, she thinks, but it’s hard to hear. Everything seems muffled and her vision blurs before focusing in on the remains of the lamia right in front of her face.

She swallows harshly and allows herself to be hauled to her feet, swaying until Stiles ducks under her arm to support her. She’s talking, of course she is, mouth moving fast and eyes tracking down Derek’s face with something close to concern. Derek watches her mouth form words, tries to put them together as her ears pop.

“Shit, shit, Derek, come on, come with me — you’re bleeding pretty bad, dude. Lydia’s scream busted one of your eardrums and we have to get the antidote. Come on, Derek.” 

She reaches up to grab at Stiles’ hand, grip sliding against the blood slicking her palm. “Sorry,” she pants, “fuck, sorry. I can’t hear you clearly. What — is it over?”

“Lydia busted through her spell and overpowered her, and Allison shot her through the heart three times. It was gross, dude, be glad you missed it. She sprouted scales all over her skin, her eyes were worse than the _kanima’s_ , like, _ugh_.” Stiles shudders, continues urging Derek toward where they parked the cars. 

“Right,” Derek says, mostly to herself, face brushing Stiles’ shoulder. 

Stiles’ voice sounds distorted, volume increasing and decreasing sporadically, echoing for a moment. She swallows against the disorientation, feels blood trickle down her jawline, the side of her face tacky with it. When she pulls back, it’s smeared across Stiles’ shirt, the pale skin of her neck under her hairline, her jaw. Derek lifts her fingers to her own face, traces the wetness to her ear, and Stiles’ hand tugs hers away immediately as she shakes her head. This blood thing is total bullshit, she thinks. She misses her mom.

“Hey, you still with me? Come on, just a little further and we’ll be at the Jeep. Deaton’s already got an antidote made up for Cora. Lydia figured it out, remember? We would have been here sooner and all, but raising Allison from the grave took a little finagling. And, uh, don’t go looking for Uncle P, yeah?”

Derek knows they’re in the Jeep now, smells Stiles’ sweaty gym clothes in the backseat, the greasy wrapper from a carton of curly fries crumpled beneath her seat — Stiles tried to put one of those scent things in here, and it smells like fake cinnamon on top of everything else. She passes out.

—

Allison’s sitting across the room from Derek when she comes to, her arms wrapped around her knees where they’re folded up on the seat of a chair. Her eyes are closed, shadowed, her face pale and slightly thinner, maybe, and Derek really doesn’t want to know how Lydia managed it. She vaguely recalls Stiles mentioning Peter, but it’s all fuzzy.

Her hearing is still a bit dull, but getting better by the second; Allison’s heartbeat grows louder and louder. 

“So, welcome back,” Derek finally offers, slowly sitting up on the exam table. The temporary stitches in her arm pull at the healing gash and she takes a deep breath. Allison looks at her calmly, accepting the sentiment with a slight incline of her neck. “Lydia finally did it, obviously. She was trying nonstop after you started appearing in her dreams. Do you… remember that?”

Allison sighs, resting her head back on the tops of her knees. Her eyes have always been dark, darker than any but Scott’s. Derek forgot the exact shade, she realizes, staring. “Yeah,” she admits. “I remember.” 

“Right.” It takes her a minute to just accept it, as she has so many times before. Denial only goes so far before it becomes more of a hindrance than a help. She spent six years swimming against the current of that river, another one or two after that. Now she knows to float downriver, to just let it take her. “Are they around?”

“Somewhere,” Allison says. “I would text them but I don’t have a phone anymore. Obviously.”

Derek pats her back pockets, relieved to find her phone in one piece, not even a crack in the screen. _All the cracks were in my ribs_ , she thinks, darkly amused. Stiles would appreciate it. 

**To: Scott McCall**  
_What’s happening?_

**From: Scott McCall**  
_on our way back, we had to clean up and stiles wanted a shake_

Derek takes a deep breath of antiseptic, cat piss, and shampoo — Lydia’s, probably used by Allison — and lays back on the table, cool beneath her. 

Stiles’ voice wakes her up again, loud and brash, incredulous laughter under the surface, and when they turn into the exam room, Scott and Stiles are pushing at each other and Lydia is judging them from behind as she files her nails while walking. Immediately, Lydia finds her way to Allison’s side, hip pressed against her shoulder, and Allison relaxes little by little against her. Derek pushes herself back up, Scott steadying her with an encouraging grin. 

“So, how’s it feel to be laid out by lamia venom?” Stiles asks, hopping up to sit next to her on the table. Her milkshake smells like chocolate and strawberry; Derek shoves her over, half-heartedly, then steals her shake. 

“Hey!” Stiles protests.

Derek scowls, says, “It’s _my_ favorite flavor.”

“Yeah, well…” Stiles does something ridiculous with her face. “It’s still my milkshake.”

“Right,” Derek says, skeptical. “Of course it is.” 

“Guys, don’t do this right now,” Scott complains. “We’ve got a lot to talk about, you know?” He glances back at Allison and Lydia in the corner and shuffles on his feet. “Loft, half an hour? If you’re up to leaving?”

“Yeah, I —” Derek rubs a hand over her face and yawns widely. “Loft is fine. Someone’s gonna have to drive me, though. No way in hell I’m running today.” 

“Stiles?”

“Yeah, yeah, I’ll take her. You going with Lydia and Allison?”

It’s so strange, how easy it sounds coming from her mouth. Like nothing ever happened, like none of them grieved for months on end after Allison died, like Stiles didn’t shrink into herself after the Nogitsune, assume culpability for all of it. A whole history of pain and loss and guilt, two years of it, erased for a moment. Derek swallows, wondering if she would ever be able to act like nothing had happened if she got her family back, whole and healthy, hale and hearty, the whole lot. 

Poor joke, really.

She isn’t sure she’d want to erase it all. So much of her development as a person stemmed from those years of her own history, of their shared history. She was wrought in fire and flame, long ago, and she stands strong enough, now, to temper her weaknesses, to grow from them. 

She intends to keep growing.

—

The conversation at the loft basically factors out to “I found Peter and sacrificed him to bring Allison back and I’m not sorry about it,” from Lydia and “Don’t look at me, I just did what she told me to,” from Stiles, which, while all true, leaves a lot out. Derek should probably be angry or sad or _something_ other than relieved that Peter’s dead, but Cora meets her eyes from across the room and Derek knows she feels it too.

Their family dynamic is so fucked up that even Malia merely blinks when she finds out Lydia killed her dad for someone who’s a stranger to her. 

Still, Scott seems lost, hovering next to Hayden by the couch rather than choosing a seat between Kira and Allison. He alternates between staring at Allison and purposefully not looking in her direction, breathing deep in a way that tells Derek he’s forcibly reminding himself to. Stiles’ gaze keeps darting between everyone, nervous and simultaneously daring anyone to say a fucking word, and Lydia’s clenched fists send the same message. Considering they literally traded Peter’s life for Allison’s today with nary a qualm, nobody’s inclined to protest. 

Allison finally speaks up, hands pressed together, once the new betas are up to speed and once the pack has fallen silent in the wake of Lydia’s simplified explanation. “I… I need to call my dad, guys.”

Derek’s claws dig into her palms before she even processes that they’re out, and she inhales sharply, turning toward the windows instead. Stiles meets her eyes from her spot before them and her wide, plush mouth is unusually thin, tight. She does something complicated with her face, rolling her head and bringing a hand up to flail as discreetly as possible at her side, and somehow Derek understands. She swallows, glances at Cora, and nods. 

Chris Argent will have a surprise coming his way, but Derek hopes he seizes the second chance and never lets go, that he doesn’t do everything Derek did when she got Cora back and drove her away for another two years. 

“Okay,” Stiles says before anyone else can respond. “Allison, why don’t you go home with Lydia tonight and you can… you can call your dad from there, have Lydia explain it to him. I — yeah, is there anything else we really need to talk about tonight or can we just be done tonight? We can fill Allison in some other time, right?” She drags a hand through her shorn hair and Derek wants to do the same, to follow it with her own.

The betas all shake their heads; Jordan pushes off from the wall across the room where he was leaning and Cora and Malia both stand up immediately to join him on his way out. “Yep, all good,” Cora says, falsely bright. “Just another fucked-up day in Beacon Hills. Why did I come back here for college again?”

“Hey, we’re having less of them!” Scott yells at their backs. He sighs, peers at the high school kids with eyebrows raised, and then jerks his head toward the door when he sees them all staring at him, hands straying toward their bags and keys. “Get home safe, guys. And make sure you study for your physics test tomorrow!”

Derek snorts because she can’t help it; Kira grins at her. 

Finally it’s just them, their weird little leftover core of the pack that started with Stiles dragging Scott McCall into the woods one winter night years ago. Lydia, despite the fierce glare on her face, gives every indication that she’s ready to break down, hard yet brittle and stretched thin enough to shatter, and Allison finally looks at Scott, at Kira and Stiles, before her eyes come to rest on Derek. After a second, she offers a small smile, an apology and question in one, and Derek relaxes into the couch, inclining her head a bit in response. 

Someone’s heartbeat picks up — Scott’s, going suddenly wild — when Lydia and Allison stand up to leave. They hesitate for a second and then he’s finally stepping forward, slowly, a hand outstretched. “Allison —”

Allison practically falls into the hug; Derek wishes for once something like this happened somewhere other than the loft. Stiles meets her eyes again, equally as awkward, and Derek just looks at her, takes in the way her hands still twist at the bottom of her t-shirt, the set of her shoulders, and she recognizes the guilt there that’s suddenly so much more pronounced than earlier.

If she tries, Derek can still hear the scream Lydia let out when the Oni stabbed Allison. If she tries, she can still remember the person Stiles used to be before the Nogitsune, too, before Donovan and all the other horrors of their lives.

Lydia turns away, and Kira, their gazes on the floor, the ceiling, anywhere but another person right now, but Derek stares, throat tight, and Stiles meets her head on because she _always_ does, like it’s a dare and a comfort in one, like it means the same thing to her that it does to Derek.

In the end, Lydia touches Allison’s lower back, pulls her into a hug of her own and out the door, and Scott takes Kira’s hand and leads her toward the door a moment after. He pauses and glances back. “Stiles, you coming?”

A knot in Derek’s chest releases when Stiles shakes her head, says, “Nah, I, uh, I still have some things I need to talk to Derek about.”

Scott nods and Kira waves at them when they leave and then it’s just Derek and Stiles in her living room, staring at each other. Derek breathes in deep, slow, lets it out just the same, and leans back against the arm of the couch, arms crossed. “What, Stiles?”

It’s a discernible energy that swirls around Stiles then, her feet suddenly in motion, hands in the air like she’d already been mid-conversation. “I’m sorry, okay? Not for bringing Allison back, but for the rest, I mean — I’m sorry we couldn’t warn you guys before we did it. It was a shitty way for this to happen and I know that. Lydia threatened to eviscerate me if I didn’t help, like I wouldn’t have anyway, and I was worried we’d lose someone else to the fucking lamia, but we couldn’t just text everyone and be like, ‘Yo, Allison is back from the dead, pack meeting at the loft after this fight, bring cookies —’” 

Derek stands up and grabs her arm when she passes, anchoring her to the spot. Stiles stops moving, outraged with this derailment, mouth still open, and Derek beats her to it. “I get it. There was no time today, even though you could have said something when you started researching.”

Stiles closes her mouth with an audible click, narrows her gaze, and goes again. “Right, but I barely know how we did it and I didn’t know if it was even worth getting Scott’s hopes up in case it _didn’t_ work. I don’t know what made Allison special, if it was just how close she and Lydia were — _are_ , I guess — or something else. Why was it possible with her? Why not — why not my mom? Or your family? Boyd and Erica and, fuck, Aiden, even?”

She draws in a breath and lets go of Stiles, turns to the side to hide her face because she’s not sure what it’s doing. “Stiles…” She sighs and steels herself for a second. “How many people have come back now? Peter, Kate, even Cora, in a way… You, Scott, and Allison died in those ice baths even before the Nogitsune, would have stayed dead without your anchors. I should have died in Mexico outside that church, and I did, for a minute. Jackson should have died the night the kanima did. It’s… not normal, but it’s… not abnormal, for us, and that’s fucked up, yeah, but we don’t get to feel bitter about it like it’s something we should have complete control over.”

It’s probably the most she’s ever said to Stiles in one go, and Stiles stands still, processing, as Derek uncrosses her arms and shrugs, her eyes on her bare feet, the chipped pedicure Cora made her get weeks ago for “sisterly bonding” even though Derek hates the smell of nail salons. “Don’t feel guilty for this,” Derek tells her toes. “I’ve dealt with a lot of guilt, and this… not for this, Stiles. I get why you did it and why you didn’t tell me — _us_ , why you didn’t tell us — so not for this.”

Stiles’ heartbeat is loud enough now that Derek wonders if Stiles can hear it herself, if her pulse is a booming thud through her veins, valves opening and closing and opening to make way for new blood, new thoughts, and then Stiles reaches out to grab Derek’s wrist, wraps her fingers there too easily. She says, “Okay, not for Allison then. For another reason.”

Derek narrows her eyes, glances up at Stiles’ face; the breath she draws in at her expression is short, sharp, and involuntary, and her ribs are still sore with the feeling of expansion, the feeling in her chest that’s not just air. “Why, then?”

Stiles is on her then, long fingers twisting into the front of her shirt as Derek stumbles back under the onslaught, gasping into her mouth, frantic with the sudden buzz of electricity zinging just under her skin, down through her bones. Stiles’ mouth is hot, her lips rough where she’s bitten them, her tongue smooth and wet against Derek’s.

“Stiles,” she says, exhales, panting for air as Stiles shoves her backwards. She loses her balance and falls across the flat of the couch, staring up at her; Stiles’ eyes, normally a brilliant golden amber, are dark and dangerous and frantic. She moves forward before Derek can rebalance on her elbows, hands closing around her forearms, pressing them back into the cushions as Stiles settles over her hips, mouth damp along Derek’s neck. 

“Please.” It slips out before Derek can catch it, between one breath and the next, and Stiles’ grip tightens, her hips flush against Derek’s. The sound of her breathing is louder now than it’s ever been before.

“Tell me yes or no, Derek. I need to hear it.” The words sink into her skin just above her carotid artery, and Derek absorbs them with a shudder, body straining up even as she relaxes into it, catches Stiles’ lips with hers, says, “Yeah, yeah, yes.”

Stiles shivers, losing her last vague semblance of control, and Derek recognizes the quick tattoo inside of her skull as the sound of Stiles’ heart — fast, strong, beautiful. She grins into the kiss, twists her legs around Stiles’ waist, and flips them both onto the floor, rolling so Stiles sprawls underneath her, pinned by Derek’s weight. Her breath whooshes out of her in a rush, eyes wide and incredulous, familiar in their indignation. 

Derek smirks purposefully, slowly, and runs her hands across Stiles’ stomach to grip the edges of her first layer, uses the hold to pull her halfway up into another kiss. Stiles bites at her, struggles to hold half of her body up as she tears her plaid overshirt off her shoulders, releasing a series of creative expletives into Derek’s shoulder when it tangles around her elbows. Stiles emits a frustrated burr of a noise, says, “Jesus, Derek, fucking _help me_. If you want to get me naked, man up — woman up, fuck, whatever, I don’t — I just —” 

She slides a hand up Stiles’ lower back to rest between her shoulder blades, the other at her hip to steady her as Stiles finally gets it off, throws it violently over the back of an armchair before her fingers are back, cradling Derek’s jaw between them, using Derek to hold herself up. The hand on Stiles’ back slides back down to dip under her t-shirt and camisole, pushes them up again on the next sweep until she’s fumbling at the clasp of Stiles’ bra. Stiles trembles against her, pressing even closer.

“Derek.”

She lifts her head from Stiles’ shoulder, licking her lower lip when she meets Stiles’ gaze. It takes two attempts before her voice unlocks. “What?”

Stiles narrows her eyes, pulls herself back again. Even now, t-shirt rumpled, bra loose under it, she could be dangerous, could be the weight that breaks Derek into pieces when so much else has failed to do so. This is the first time she has really _known_ the woman undressing before her could kill her if she so desired, but she _won’t_ — Stiles could, if she was determined enough, if she or her family were crossed; she _has_ killed others before to protect her pack and herself — but she’s only ever done her utmost to save Derek, like she’s worth something.

It changes everything.

“Don’t ‘ _what_ ’ me while you’re trying to get into my pants, asshole.” 

Derek rolls her eyes and lifts her eyebrows expectantly. “Fine, _sweetheart_ —” Stiles smacks her side and Derek huffs, ignores the all-too-natural taste of the endearment on her tongue. “ _What_?”

“There you go again,” Stiles complains, flopping back on the floor and glaring up at Derek. She swallows sharply against the rush of arousal at that, bares her teeth and settles her hands on Stiles’ hips again, shoving her shirts up to catch under her breasts. Stiles gasps when Derek wetly kisses one of the moles just above the waist of her pants, wiggles her hips up off the ground even as Derek deftly undoes the button, pushes her jeans halfway down her thighs. 

“Come on, come _on_.”

“Shut _up_ ,” Derek snaps, leaning forward on her knees to bite at Stiles’ collarbone, hands back at Stiles’ sides to finally pull her shirts _off_ , god, Derek _hates_ all the layers. “Lift your shoulders, too.”

“Don’t tell me what to do.” Stiles listens, though, her arms above her head, back arched so Derek’s chin skims across her sternum as the shirts fall to the floor. Derek breathes in deep through her nose, presses her lips to the thin skin between her teeth and Stiles’ hummingbird heart. She finds the loose straps of Stiles’ bra, tugs them down her arms to get it all the way off, and then Stiles shoves her.

Derek growls but sits back on Stiles’ stomach, eyes wide and impatient. “Again, _what_ , Stiles?” 

“Fucking take your clothes off is what!” Stiles stares up at her defiantly, torso bare, pants halfway down her legs, and Derek wants to _taste_ , wants to trail her mouth across Stiles’ bare skin _everywhere_ , to hear her suck in a breath and moan and plead. She tears her shirt over her head, lets Stiles work at the clasp of her jeans even as she works at her sports bra. She leans back to shove her jeans down her thighs, forward again to lift her knees out of them, and she startles at the sudden grasp Stiles has on her neck, pulling her down with a rough inhale. 

She brushes over Stiles’ stomach, her breasts, and then she’s settled on top of her, their mouths working fast and hot together, bodies flush from thigh to shoulder. Stiles is warmer than she always expected, this way, smooth and fragile-strong, all bone and muscle and _heat_.

“Stiles,” she says, awe and desperation, frustration. “ _Stiles_.”

“Shut up, shut _up_.” Stiles is gasping too, hips arching off the floor impatiently, feet spread wide to give her leverage. 

“Just — let me — ” Derek pulls back again, drops helpless kisses down Stiles’ sternum, over her heart, across one of her nipples — Stiles’ hips jump against her again and Derek grins as she focuses there, fingers curling under the edges of Stiles’ underwear. 

“Okay, yeah, good — good idea, oh my god,” Stiles pants, her hands pushing at Derek’s shoulders with all of her surprising strength. Air whistles through her lips when Derek grazes the insides of her thighs as she yanks her underwear down, and she yelps when Derek sucks at the skin just below her hipbone. “Oh, shit. I — why do you wear boxer briefs, god, why is that attractive? Can you — take yours off, Derek, get them _off_.”

“You’re so _bossy_.” Derek sits back, scowling again. Her mouth feels swollen already. Stiles props herself up on her elbows to glare back, entirely bare and unconcerned, bringing her thigh up to nudge Derek in the side. She rolls her eyes but takes the hint, standing up on her knees again to shove her last bit of clothing off, tossing it behind her with the rest of their clothes. Stiles’ eyes move fast, cataloguing, studying, and Derek feels like she should be embarrassed by the scrutiny, given Stiles’ penchant for being an asshole, but Stiles presses up to kiss her, slow and deep now, catching her off guard.

 _Oh_. Derek swallows, lifts suddenly shaking hands to grasp at Stiles’ ribs, feeling the depth of her breathing, the shrink and expansion of delicate bone. Everything slows for a moment, warm and close in a way Derek’s missed for a long, long time. Every breath she takes is Stiles, every scent and sound, and she settles quickly, kneeling over Stiles’ lap and relaxing into her.

For all Stiles is sharp words and quick wit and edges thrown around in defense, she is also this: full of intention, communicative even through mere touch, absorbing every detail and adjusting with each one. Derek’s heart thrums an unsteady rhythm in her chest as Stiles changes the angle of the kiss, hand firm against the back of her neck to hold her there. 

Stiles shakes minutely, just enough for Derek to notice, and she guides them back to the floor, legs still bracketing Stiles’ hips, and drags her mouth down Stiles’ long neck. Her breath rasps in her throat as Derek scrapes blunt teeth along her skin. 

“Please, Derek, please —” 

It’s the first time Stiles has actually asked for anything rather than demanded or outright taken, and Derek rewards her, biting down gently, worrying the skin between her teeth as she brushes light hands over Stiles’ shoulders, down her arms to her hands; her fingers find the gaps between Stiles’ and immediately Stiles folds around them, grip tight and frantic, palms sweaty.

Derek thinks about how young Stiles is, twenty to her twenty-six, how Stiles rushes headlong into everything but this — how this has been growing between them for years, how both of them strained away from it almost angrily, guiltily — Heather, Jennifer, Malia, Braeden, Jordan, everyone but each other. 

And now she gets to _have_ , to suck a hickey over Stiles’ left breast where her shirt won’t expose it, to feel the triumph that rushes through her when Stiles gasps her name out as she thumbs over a nipple, tongue wet in its wake. Stiles, beneath her, is a live wire, every touch bright and electric and quick to get a response, just like she expected. 

Stiles shudders under her ministrations, takes Derek’s wrist and firmly shoves it down her body until Derek’s laughing quietly into her shoulder at the silent demand. She pulls back, then, ignores Stiles’ loud squawk of protest, and slides back down until she can grab Stiles’ thighs and lift one leg over her shoulder, calf firm along her back. Stiles’ breath hitches automatically, eyes wide, lower lip caught between her teeth where she’s raised herself onto her elbows to watch. Derek pauses to catch her gaze, questioning.

“Derek,” she says; she swallows, licks her lips, visibly gathering herself. “Yeah. God, yes.”

It’s all Derek needs before she’s nose-first in the crease where Stiles’ hip and leg meet, breathing deep. Her hands sweep Stiles’ thighs, absorbing every aborted shiver of muscle, every hair rising under her light touch. When she brushes up against her center, Stiles is wet and warm, her breath fast and shallow. The leg over Derek’s shoulder pulls her in further and Derek grins, rewarding her with a kiss over the top of her pubic bone, more pressure on her clit. 

“Hurry up, hurry up, hurry up.” Stiles tries to lift her hips and Derek immediately withdraws her hands, pinning them to the floor and glaring at her. Stiles looks indignant, mouth open to criticize, and Derek shakes her head, eyes her warningly as she dips back down. The first syllable of Stiles’ insult immediately catches in a surprised yelp as Derek licks up her slit, transforms into a moan when Derek nips at the top of her thigh, one hand back on her cunt. 

“Okay?” Derek asks, drawing back the slightest amount. Stiles scowls at her, says, “Ha, ha, asshole. Put that smart mouth back to work,” and Derek does, presses down and uses everything she knows.

She finds out that Stiles like alternation, that she’s sensitive along her lips, that she writhes around when Derek tongues at the rim of her vagina until Derek pushes two fingers up and in — her back arches up immediately, hands smacking down at her sides, and Derek watches her face with rapt attention, the way her eyelids flutter, her eyebrows twitching together, mouth slack and red from where she continues to bite at it. She has to pin her hips down with her forearm then to keep her against the concrete, and even then Stiles fights her. She sucks at her clit lightly, feels Stiles tightening around her fingers, slick and greedy, until Stiles gasps, sharp, mouth wide as she finally clamps down, muscles contracting rhythmically. 

Derek pulls her mouth away without being told to, leaves her fingers where they are as she grins, bestowing quick kisses on Stiles’ hips, finally releasing her from her hold. Stiles trembles under her, tension relaxing slowly, and Derek rests her temple on her stomach. Her head rises and falls with every breath, short growing long, until Stiles’ fingers catch in the knots of her hair, her other leg curling around Derek’s waist. 

“Uh, so, wow,” Stiles says, still staring at the ceiling.

Derek snorts, rests where she is until Stiles squirms. She pulls her hand away then, feels the full-body tautness that immediately returns, the subsequent little tremors before Stiles smacks the top of her head.

“Rude,” she chides, eyes closed, and Stiles laughs, short and sharp. 

“Yeah, well, you knew what you were getting into. Literally,” Stiles muses, and Derek pokes her in the ribs, relishes the yelp of surprise and the way she half jack-knifes up to curl around Derek’s head. “And you say _I’m_ rude?”

“Seriously? You can’t even be quiet and calm after an orgasm?” Derek demands, looking up Stiles’ torso.

Stiles grins proudly, winks in a way that immediately reminds Derek that she herself hasn’t gotten off. She really doesn’t understand why she finds Stiles attractive at all, why she wants to do this and everything and more for always; she’s good at lying to herself when she needs to be. 

“Seriously?” Stiles draws her eyebrows together mockingly, frown deep and false — her mouth tightens with a hidden smile, the corners of her eyes creasing despite her intentions, and Derek drags herself upward to kiss her. Stiles immediately brings her hands up to cradle Derek’s face, draws her fingers lightly over her cheeks, her jawline, presses into the kisses slow and soft and immersive. 

Derek melts against her, and now she’s the one falling apart, panting into what should be easy kisses. Instead her body is alive, reminded of its own arousal, both excited by and scared of Stiles’ intensity. She should have known, she thinks vaguely, that Stiles’ full focus would burn her up from the inside out. Even the small pieces of Stiles she’s had before have lit the match under her skin — as a whole, she’s pinned down, turned inside-out, and it’s addictive already.

She lets Stiles squeeze a leg between hers, grinds back with a quiet moan as Stiles’ long fingers find her hips, guide her down. “C’mon, Derek,” Stiles whispers into her skin, and she opens her mouth around a quiet gasp, lets Stiles kiss her insistently, one hand slipping under her, the other still tight on her hip. Derek shivers when Stiles’ fingers drag firmly over her clit, added pressure from where she’s helplessly grinding on her thigh. “C’mon, c’mon, come on, that’s it, Derek, you got it —”

“Stiles,” she moans, mouth sloppy against her cheek, “shut up and just — oh, _shit_.”

Stiles laughs again, light, and Derek rolls her hips down greedily, panting and trying not to whine. She’s on-edge, so fucking close she can feel her muscles fluttering, and Stiles slows, the fucking _sadist_ , her mouth on Derek’s breast — Derek’s spine snaps upright suddenly, body tight as she moans. She has no idea what just happened to push her over the edge but — god, that edge is good and gone, the resulting orgasm hot and quick through her like wildfire. Her _toes_ curl, fingers digging into Stiles’ biceps, forehead resting on her collarbone, which is damp with sweat. 

Derek blinks, breathing quick; her eyelashes stick together a bit, and she gasps, “What?”

Stiles strokes her side, lets her fully collapse on top of her because Derek’s arms won’t hold her up any longer. “You good?”

“I — holy shit, what did you _do_?” Derek asks, dazed.

Stiles conceals a smirk against the top of her head — Derek knows. She can’t see, but she just _knows_ Stiles is cocky as fuck when she gets someone off. “Don’t worry about it, just enjoy it.”

“You’re a jerk,” Derek grumbles, closing her eyes. Stiles’ pulse thunders under her ear, steady and ever-quick, and Derek doesn’t want to move for at least a few years. 

“Yeah, again, you knew that.” Stiles is quiet, smug, and exhausted under her, touch light and soothing. She traces Derek’s tattoo hesitantly, then more firmly when Derek doesn’t tense. 

Derek listens to Stiles’ heart, her breathing, feels the sweat between them cool and dry until Stiles shivers under her, just a bit, tucking her limbs under Derek’s covertly. She huffs and pushes the top of her head up into Stiles’ chin, and Stiles immediately stills, fidgets minutely, and then mutters under her breath.

“What?” It comes out almost as a statement, but Derek can’t be blamed right now. This time it’s all Stiles, like her vocabulary has been reduced to one syllable in the wake of Stiles shoving her onto the couch.

“I said, it’s not that I’m not a fan of this whole cuddling thing — if that’s what this is, I mean, maybe it’s not cuddling, what do I know? — but, like, could we maybe do this… in your bed? Under the covers? I figured your werewolfy heat would be enough, but I’m still getting cold, honestly.”

She is — Derek moves her hand and the coolness of Stiles’ skin startles her a bit toward the waking world again. “Fine,” she rasps, rolling off of Stiles. The concrete is cold against her bare ass, so Derek gets it, and considering it’s the first time they’ve ever done this, she regrets it for half a second, that it happened this way, on the floor of the loft after a fucked-up day and another near-argument. But that disappears when she looks at Stiles, sees the flush still edging down her chest, her sleepy, content eyes and red mouth. Derek breathes out, shaky, and pushes herself to standing, offering her a hand. “Come on, upstairs.”

Stiles blinks at her for a second and then scrambles to obey, fingers tight around Derek’s; she doesn’t let go once she’s standing, though, leaning forward to kiss Derek’s shoulder while watching her from the corner of her eye, and Derek tilts her head to catch her lips again. Like this, it’s easy, the sour smell of guilt from earlier faded into a musky sweetness that’s all _them_. 

Derek would be lying if she ever claimed she minded.

They end up showering, because Derek cleaned up a bit before the meeting but spent most of today covered in blood and dirt and her hair is still knotted with it, and then Stiles crawls up her bed without asking, like she belongs, and Derek just follows, nosing the side of her waist and closing her eyes against everything. 

“So do I still need to feel guilty over this anymore or can I have this? Can I have you?” Stiles says when Derek’s mouth is open against her collarbone, Derek’s hands bracketing her shoulders. She can literally feel Stiles thinking, talking herself up for a rejection like Derek’s leg between hers isn’t a sign that Derek never wants her to leave this bed again. She growls, just a bit, against her, and Stiles finally puts her hands on her, pulls her closer until they’re flush together. “Use your words, buddy, I don’t understand wolf.”

Derek flops her head down on Stiles’ shoulder, stares at the wall balefully. “You’re the worst and for some reason I like it,” she says, still as baffled by it now as she was a year ago, two years ago. “There’s something wrong with me, but you — yeah, you can have whatever you want. I think I’m the guilty one here, but I don’t even give a fuck anymore.”

Stiles shakes a bit under her, and Derek realizes she’s laughing, turns her head to inhale the scent of her skin under her jaw and hides a smile there, the start of a stockpile for later that she can find whenever she presses her face against the frail skin. “Yeah,” Stiles agrees, “I could have told you something is wrong with you, but I won’t because I’m nice and I want to have sex again instead, like, lots of sex, sex until we die.”

“That’s a hardship,” Derek mutters, grinning. Stiles scoffs at her and calls her an asshole, but hours later, she falls asleep next to her, arm flung across Derek’s stomach, and she’s still there in the morning, expecting coffee and stealing a shirt and then a kiss, a round of them. Derek backs her against the counter, tasting coffee and Stiles and faint hints of herself from the night before, and she smiles into it. She calls her sweetheart again by accident and Stiles melts against her, easy as breathing, oddly speechless for just a second. Of all the new normals life has dealt her, this is one Derek wants, this one with a too-fast mouth and hands and heart right in front of her, and she’s okay admitting that.

—

**Author's Note:**

> Full disclosure: I have not watched Teen Wolf properly since the end of 3B, so I marked this as future fic because I tried to stick to what canon (minus Allison’s resurrection) I gathered from random eps/tumblr gifsets, but let me know if “alternate universe” is more apt for details about the betas/other weird shit that occurred after I stopped watching.


End file.
